Rebels Bar Future Philippine Talks : Communists to Resume War When Truce Ends; Peasant Killings Blamed

Communist insurgents Friday formally ruled out any future peace talks with the embattled government of President Corazon Aquino, declaring that they are prepared to resume their “just war” when a temporary cease-fire ends Feb. 8.

The National Democratic Front, which has negotiated with the government on behalf of the Communist Party and its armed wing, the New People’s Army, said in a statement announcing its decision that the killing of 19 unarmed peasant protesters by government soldiers on Jan. 22 “reveals the dark and ugly side of the Aquino government, hiding behind the flutter of yellow ribbons and the mask of democratic liberalism.”

But one New People’s Army commander, interviewed Friday afternoon in Manila, said the decision to call off further talks was made after this week’s mutiny within the armed forces convinced the left’s political leaders that “President Aquino obviously is not in charge of her military.”

‘Emancipation Struggles’

The front’s statement said, “The recent aborted coup attempt by an ultrareactionary faction . . . is but a logical phenomenon in a society rife with intensifying people’s struggles for social emancipation.”

Leftist street marchers blanketed Manila’s downtown district with copies of the announcement during a defiant but violence-free march marking the burial of the protesters, who were killed when they tried to march to the presidential palace to protest the government’s inaction on land reform.

On the day of the killings, the front had suspended indefinitely its participation in the talks, which began Jan. 6 in an effort to find a political solution to the 18-year insurgency that has cost the lives of more than 2,000 Filipinos since Aquino took office last February.

“Our flickering hopes to find a common ground for immediate peace with this government died when military men mercilessly killed the . . . peasants, workers, youth and students at Mendiola Bridge,” the front said in its statement, referring to the bridge near the palace where the peasants were gunned down.

Right to Defense

The front said the insurgents would continue to observe the 60-day cease-fire until it expires, “but we will assert the right to defend ourselves, and the revolutionary forces and the people we represent, against any further armed operations of the military.”

The statement by the left took the Aquino government by surprise. The president, campaigning in Davao on the southern island of Mindanao for adoption of a new constitution in a referendum Monday, told a large crowd that her government would seek to resume the peace talks.

But the National Democratic Front statement appeared to leave no room for negotiation.

“In many ways,” it said, “the Mendiola massacre . . . mirrors the continuing basic contradictions and conflict riving Philippine society. It manifests the inherent inability of an elite government to heed the people’s fundamental demands. . . .

“For all their exhortations about defending democracy and progress. . . , competing factions of the elite classes share the same standpoint of being anti-people, anti-revolution and pro-feudal. They differ only in their choice of approach or method of repressing the people. While the militarists opt for an outright campaign of force, the Aquino faction chooses to combine an iron-hand approach with a deceptive soft-line method in its counterinsurgency program.”

Constitution ‘Flawed’

The front, an umbrella group of 10 organizations, objected specifically to what it called a government effort to base a peace settlement on provisions of the proposed constitution, which it described as “fatally flawed.”

In recent interviews, several leftist leaders have said that the proposed constitution, which was drafted by 48 men and women handpicked by Aquino and her largely upper-class advisers, was anti-nationalist and anti-poor.

That was also the message carried by the leftist and radical organizations that marched on the palace Friday afternoon. Some of the more than 5,000 marchers held banners calling for a “no” vote Monday.

The march began with funeral services in a working-class church in suburban Caloocan for two of the demonstrators killed in the Jan. 22 march to the palace. At first there were only a few hundred participants, who gathered at a cemetery for the burial of Angelito Gutierrez, a 22-year-old youth organizer, and Rodrigo Grampa, about 30, a labor organizer.

‘People’s Enemy’

Standing on the hood of a jeep, Jaime Tadeo, leader of the Movement of Filipino Farmers, which had organized the demonstration that ended with the killings, told the marchers, “The Armed Forces of the Philippines is not the protector of the people; it’s the enemy of the people.”

Referring to the military uprisings this week, he complained that the military was willing to negotiate a nonviolent settlement with the rebel soldiers but unwilling to negotiate with the farmers the week before.

Behind Tadeo was a poster showing Aquino, arms upraised, standing between firing troops and fallen demonstrators.

The marchers gathered strength as they entered the heart of Manila, stopping for a rally at the main post office, then proceeding to Mendiola Bridge, where riot policemen and troops stood ready with batons and metal shields. Beyond the bridge, on the road leading to the presidential palace, stood fire trucks and water cannons.

‘Going Slow’

But there was no repetition of last week’s violence. The leaders of Friday’s march said they had no intention of moving on the palace.

“We’re still assessing the situation,” one said. “We’re going slow.”

As the marchers approached the bridge, waving red banners calling for justice for the slain peasants, the riot police fell back and allowed them to proceed to the bridge. There they were met by a group of government officials, including Aquino’s executive secretary, Joker Arroyo, and three Cabinet ministers.

The disciplined marchers stopped midway on the bridge and conducted a Mass for the fallen. It was considered a symbolic victory that they reached this point. Augusto Sanchez, the former labor minister who was forced to resign last month on charges that his leftist policies were endangering the government, said: “Remember, from 1972 until last Monday, no march was permitted to reach the bridge.”

It was in 1972 that President Ferdinand E. Marcos imposed martial law, and last Monday a peaceful march marking the peasant killings was allowed to cross the bridge and proceed to the gates of the palace.

‘Mass Is Customary’

Government aides brought Father Ramon de Jesus and two other priests from San Beda College, which is located not far from the bridge, and the Mass was conducted.

“We buried our dead this morning; a Mass is customary,” said Leandro Alejandro, a leader of Bagong Alyasang Makabayan, a leftist group that helped organize Friday’s march.

The service was preceded by a round of anti-government speeches while the military waited down the road.

“They (the marchers) believe in symbolism,” Arroyo observed as the air was filled with radical harangues. “There’ll be a Mass, then they’ll turn away.”

At the conclusion of the Mass, with darkness falling, the mourners marched to the front rank of the riot police, chanting slogans. They stood for a time face-to-face with the police, then wheeled and moved off down a side street, their voices echoing off the walls.

Jose C. Concepcion, minister of trade and industry and one of the Cabinet members who met with the marchers, remarked on the difference between Friday’s demonstration and last week’s bloody clash, and added: “It proves you do not let the military negotiate. They’re no good at it.”

Just 36 hours earlier, Concepcion had been the sole civilian representative in a group of military officers who negotiated an end to the military uprising at a Manila broadcast station.